From Heidi Blake and Christopher Hope, the Telegraph: Al-Qaeda is actively tring to secure nuclear material and recruiting rogue scientists to build a radioactive "dirty" bomb, according to leaked diplomatic documents. …
Thousands of classified American cables obtained by the WikiLeaks website and passed to The Daily Telegraph detail the international struggle to stop the spread of weapons-grade nuclear, chemical and biological material around the globe.
At a Nato meeting in January 2009, security chiefs briefed member states that al-Qaeda was plotting a programme of "dirty radioactive IEDs", makeshift nuclear roadside bombs that could be used against British troops in Afghanistan.
As well as causing a large explosion, a "dirty bomb" attack would contaminate the area for many years. …
Alerts about the smuggling of nuclear material, sent to Washington from foreign US embassies, document how criminal and terrorist gangs were trafficking large amounts of highly radioactive material across Europe, Africa and the Middle East. …
Tomihiro Taniguchi, the deputy director-general of the IAEA, has privately warned America that the world faces the threat of a "nuclear 9/11" if stores of uranium and plutonium were not secured against terrorists. (photo: Reuters)
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